1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a contents additional service inquiry server for inquiring additional services of contents with respect to user terminals, and a contents additional service providing system using that contents additional service inquiry server.
2. Description of the Related Art
Only one contents identifier is assigned to each contents so that the system utilizing the contents identifier can be considered as providing a function of the so called “census registration database” with respect to the contents which provides the only reliable meta data regarding the contents authorized by the contents holder.
However, from a viewpoint of the contents user side, this alone is insufficient. In addition, it is indispensable to provide a mechanism for ascertaining the information regarding the utilization method of the contents, i.e., what additional services (services such as acquisition of an original of the contents, attribute inquiry, contents alteration detection, checking of an identity of the contents provider, secondary utilization permission negotiation agency, for example) related to that contents can be received, and a mechanism for selecting the related service according to the need.
FIG. 13 shows a configuration of a conventional realization system and FIGS. 14A and 14B show a conventional processing sequence chart.
In FIG. 13, 51 is a user terminal, 52 is a network such as the Internet, 53 is a contents additional service inquiry server (service gateway) for carrying out the inquiry of the additional service providing servers, 54 is a correspondence table for describing a correspondence relationship of keywords and available additional service providing servers, 55 to 57 are additional service providing servers, 58 is a contents center for providing contents and providing additional services, and 59 and 60 are contents.
The contents center 58 for providing the contents is usually operated either directly by a contents holder who has the copyright of the contents or by a party who is entrusted from that contents holder.
The contents holder 58 provides a formal attribute inquiry service (for displaying a title, a creator, a creation date, etc.) as the copyright holder, an alteration detection service, an original data downloading service, a contents provider identity checking service, etc., with respect to the contents provided by that center.
On the other hand, the additional service providing servers 55 to 57 are servers operated by third parties who are not directly related to the copyright holders, for providing additional services that can be operated without having the copyright such as a contents secondary utilization permission negotiation agent service, a contents related product sale, etc.
Next, according to FIGS. 14A and 14B, the conventional processing sequence with such a configuration will be described.
In the conventional contents additional service providing of this type, first the user obtains the contents 59 from the contents center 58 (procedure 62). Then, the user first associates a keyword from that obtained contents 60 (59) (procedure 63).
Then, the user makes a connection from the user terminal 51 through the network 52 to the contents additional service inquiry server 53, and requests an additional service search by using the keyword associated from the above described obtained contents 60 (procedure 64).
Here, this keyword to be specified by the user can be one that indicates a type of the service such as “attribute search”/“acquisition of original”/“right management proxy”, etc., or one that indicates a type of contents such as “Mt. Fuji”/“a picture of the sea”, etc.
On the other hand, the contents center 58 and the additional service providing servers 55 to 57 register the keyword of the additional service provided by the own server into the contents additional service inquiry server 53 in advance (procedures 65 and 66). This keyword on the additional service providing server side is also similar to the above described keyword to be specified by the user.
The contents additional service inquiry server 53 produces the correspondence table 54 for describing the correspondence relationship of the registered keywords and the additional services (procedure 67). Then, the contents additional service inquiry server 53 obtains the information of the additional service registered in the above described correspondence table 54 in response to the additional service inquiry request from the user (procedure 68), and returns the corresponding additional service list to the user (procedure 69).
The user terminal 51 selects the necessary additional service according to that returned additional service list (procedure 70), and this time makes the additional service request to the additional service providing server 56 or the like (procedure 71).
At this point, suppose that the selected additional service is the attribute information displaying, for example. The providing of the service from the additional service providing server 56 is started (procedure 72).
The conventional system for searching the additional service for the contents has been such that the keyword associated from the contents 60 obtained by the user and the keyword associated to the own additional service by the service provider are matched at the contents additional service inquiry server 53. For this reason, the following two problems arise.
The first problem is that it is very difficult to find the available additional service uniquely for the contents possessed by the user because it is a search based on an ambiguous parameter in a form of the keyword.
In the case of the directory service for searching a desired home page on the Internet, the search using a free keyword has a possibility of providing a list of pages that are not intended as the specified keyword is taken for a different meaning, or of providing too many candidates to be narrowed down one by one manually because the keyword is too ambiguous. Moreover, as can be easily guessed from the case of associating the keyword to the 2 hour long movie, for example, the keyword association with respect to the contents contains even more ambiguity than the Web pages.
On the other hand, from a viewpoint of the additional service providing service side, it is impossible to judge whether the additional service with respect to that contents can be provided or not unless the contents owned by the user are accurately identified. Consequently, the keyword association at the additional service providing server side is also not unique.
As described, in the prior art, the means capable of uniquely identifying the additional service providing server that is really related to the contents without any ambiguity, with respect to the contents owned by the user, is not provided.
The second problem is that the means by which the user can distinguish the legitimate additional service operated by the contents center which delivered that contents and the additional service provided by the third party which is not delivering the contents is not provided.
Among the additional services for the contents owned by the user, services such as the attribute inquiry service (for displaying a title, a creator, a creation date, etc.), the alteration detection service, the original data downloading service, and the contents provider identity checking service should be provided by the contents holder or an organization to which the operation is formally entrusted by the contents holder.
However, in the method for carrying out the keyword matching on the contents additional service inquiry server, the identification of the target contents is difficult so that there is no method for judging whether it is a legitimate service from the contents center or not at the contents additional service inquiry server.
On the other hand, from a viewpoint of the contents center side, it is impossible to identify whether it is really a legitimate service with respect to that contents or not unless the legitimate services registered at the contents additional service inquiry server are registered only from the contents center. Consequently, in the prior art, there is no method for judging whether it is really a legitimate additional service operated by the contents center which has delivered that contents or not, with respect to the contents owned by the user.
An object of the present invention is to provide a contents additional service inquiry server and a contents additional service providing system which are capable of enabling the unique identification of the additional service providing server that is really related to the contents from the contents owned at the user terminal, and also the identification as to whether that additional service providing server is operated by the contents center which has delivered that contents or operated by a third party.